Traditionally, sodalime glass is used for the fabrication of thin film solar cells. Problems are associated with the photovoltaic cells that use sodalime glass or stainless steel sheets as substrates. The sodalime glass substrates are brittle. Furthermore, the sodalime glass substrate is rigid and not flexible, which limits its applications to only flat surfaces. Moreover, the sodalime glass substrate is an electrical insulator and is expensive, which is about 40% of PV fabrication cost. The high cost of the substrate material results in a high price of the finished devices. Additionally, the Tg (glass transition temperature) of sodalime glass substrate limits the selenization temperature. Comparing the more recent PV cell with a stainless steel sheet or a metallic sheet as a substrate with the traditional PV cell with sodalime glass as a substrate, the stainless steel/metallic sheet substrate has a more flexible and conductive structure than the sodalime glass substrate. The flexibility increases the uses of the PV cell. Nonetheless, the rolled stainless steel sheet substrate is inferior than the sodalime glass substrate in a way that the stainless steel substrate has a rougher surface. Moreover, the metal contained in the typical stainless steel substrate is able to be a source of metallic contamination (such as Fe, Ni, and other impurities) to CIGS semiconductors, because the metals contained (such as Fe and Ni) is able to diffuse through Mo grain boundaries to short the cell. Especially, the typical selenization temperature under inert atmosphere is between 500° C. and 750° C. At such temperature, the diffusion rate of Fe and Ni becomes very fast and the kinetics favors Fe diffusion through the open grain boundary between Mo grains. Also, at this high temperature, molten Se in the CIS (copper indium selenide) or CIGS (Copper indium gallium (di)selenide: a tetrahedrally bonded semiconductor) layer above the Mo diffuses through the Mo grain boundaries to attack the stainless substrate beneath the Mo, shorting out the solar cells. These defects typically result in cells with greatly reduced efficiencies and the substrates are often scrapped. High scrap loses and accompanying low efficiency cells produces expensive solar cells, which are not commercially viable.